Ariosophy

The ideology regarding the Aryan race (in the sense of Indo-Europeans), runic symbols, the swastika, and sometimes occultism are important elements of Ariosophy. By 1899 at the earliest or by 1900 at the latest, esoteric notions entered Guido von List's thoughts.[2] In April 1903, he sent his manuscript, proposing what Goodrick-Clarke calls a "monumental pseudoscience" concerning the ancient German faith, to the Imperial Academy of Sciences in Vienna[3] onwards. These Ariosophic ideas (together with, and influenced by, Theosophy) contributed significantly to an occult counterculture in Germany and Austria. A historic interest in this topic has stemmed from the ideological relationship between Ariosophy and Nazism, and it is obvious in such book titles as:

• The Occult Roots of Nazism by Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke
• Der Mann, der Hitler die Ideen gab (The Man Who Gave Hitler His Ideas), Wilfried Daim's biography of Lanz von Liebenfels

However, Goodrick-Clarke's comprehensive study finds little evidence of direct influence, except in the case of the highly idiosyncratic ancient-German mythos that was elaborated by the "clairvoyant" SS-Brigadeführer Karl Maria Wiligut,[Note 1] of which the practical consequences were, first, the incorporation of Wiligut's symbolism into the ceremonies of an elite circle within the SS; and, secondly, the official censure of those occultists and runic magicians whom Wiligut stigmatized as heretics, which may have persuaded Heinrich Himmler to order the internment of several of them.[Note 2] The most notable other case is Himmler's Ahnenerbe. (For the debate on the direct relations to Nazi ideology, see Religious aspects of Nazism.) Goodrick-Clarke examines what evidence there is for influences on Hitler and other Nazis, but he concludes that "Ariosophy is a symptom of rather than an influence in the way that it anticipated Nazism".[7]

Guido von List in 1910 from the book Guido v. List: Der Wiederentdecker Uralter Arischer Weisheit by Johannes Balzli, published in 1917

Guido von List elaborated a racial religion premised on the concept of renouncing the imposed Semitic creed of Christianity and returning to the native religions of the ancient Indo-Europeans (List preferred the equivalent term Ario-Germanen, or 'Aryo-Germanics'). He recognised the theoretical distinction between the Proto-Indo-European language and its daughter Proto-Germanic language, but frequently obscured it by his tendency to treat them as a single long-lived entity (although this framing is also used in linguistics as the Germanic parent language).[10] In this, he became strongly influenced by the Theosophical thought of Madame Blavatsky, which he blended however with his own highly original beliefs, founded upon Germanic paganism.[11]

Before he turned to occultism, Guido List had written articles for German Nationalist newspapers in Austria, as well as four historical novels and three plays, some of which were "set in tribal Germany" before the advent of Christianity.[12] He also had written an anti-semitic essay in 1895. List adopted the aristocratic von between 1903 and 1907.

List called his doctrine Armanism after the Armanen, supposedly a body of priest-kings in the ancient Aryo-Germanic nation. He claimed that this German name had been Latinized into the tribal name Herminones mentioned in Tacitus, and that it actually meant the heirs of the sun-king: an estate of intellectuals who were organised into a priesthood called the Armanenschaft.[13]

His conception of the original religion of the Germanic tribes was a form of sun worship, with its priest-kings (similar to the Icelandic goði) as legendary rulers of ancient Germany. Religious instruction was imparted on two levels. The esoteric doctrine (Armanism) was concerned with the secret mysteries of the gnosis, reserved for the initiated elite, while the exoteric doctrine (Wotanism) took the form of popular myths intended for the lower social classes.[14]

List believed that the transition from Wotanism to Christianity had proceeded smoothly under the direction of the skald poets, so that native customs, festivals and names were preserved under a Christian veneer and only needed to be "decoded" back into their heathen forms.[15] This peaceful merging of the two religions had been disrupted by the forcible conversions under "bloody Charlemagne – the Slaughterer of the Saxons".[16] List claimed that the dominance of the Roman Catholic Church in Austria-Hungary constituted a continuing occupation of the Germanic tribes by the Roman empire, albeit now in a religious form, and a continuing persecution of the ancient religion of the Germanic peoples and Celts.

He also believed in the magical powers of the old runes. From 1891 onwards he claimed that heraldry was based on a system of encoded runes, so that heraldic devices conveyed a secret heritage in cryptic form. In April 1903, he submitted an article concerning the alleged Aryan proto-language to the Imperial Academy of Sciences in Vienna. Its highlight was a mystical and occult interpretation of the runic alphabet, which became the cornerstone of his ideology. Although the article was rejected by the academy, it would later be expanded by List, and grew into his final masterpiece, a comprehensive treatment of his linguistic and historical theories, published in 1914 as Die Ursprache der Ario-Germanen und ihre Mysteriensprache (The Proto-Language of the Aryo-Germanics and their Mystery Language).

List's doctrine has been described as gnostic, pantheist, and deist.[17] At its core is the mystical union of God, man, and nature. Wotanism teaches that God dwells within the individual human spirit as an inner source of magical power, but is also immanent within nature through the primal laws that govern the cycles of growth, decay, and renewal. List explicitly rejects a Mind-body dualism of spirit versus matter, or of God over or against nature. Humanity is therefore one with the universe, which entails an obligation to live in accordance with nature. But the individual human ego does not seek to merge with the cosmos. "Man is a separate agent, necessary to the completion or perfection of ‘God's work’".[18] Being immortal, the ego passes through successive reincarnations until it overcomes all obstacles to its purpose. List foresaw the eventual consequences of this in a future utopia on Earth, which he identified with the promised Valhalla, a world of victorious heroes:

Thus in the course of uncounted generations all men will become Einherjar, and that state – willed and preordained by the godhead – of general liberty, equality, and fraternity will be reached. This is that state which sociologists long for and which socialists want to bring about by false means, for they are not able to comprehend the esoteric concept that lies hidden in the triad: liberty, equality, fraternity, a concept which must first ripen and mature in order that someday it can be picked like a fruit from the World Tree.[19]

List was familiar with the cyclical notion of time, which he encountered in Norse mythology and in the theosophical adaptation of the Hindu time cycles. He had already made use of cosmic rhythms in his early journalism on natural landscapes.[20] In his later works,[Note 3] List combined the cyclical concept of time with the "dualistic and linear time scheme" of western apocalypticism, which counterposes a pessimism about the present world with an ultimate optimism regarding the future one.[22] In Das Geheimnis der Runen,[23] List addresses the seeming contradiction by explaining the final redemption of the linear time frame as an exoteric parable that stands for the esoteric truth of renewal in many future cycles and incarnations. This is counter to the original Norse myths and Hinduism, where the cycle of destruction and creation is repeated indefinitely, thus offering no possibility of ultimate salvation.[24]

Jörg Lanz von Liebenfels (code name of the fascist agitator Adolf Joseph Lanz)

Flag of the Order of the New Templars

In 1903–04, a Viennese ex-Cistercian monk and inventor named Jörg Lanz-Liebenfels (subsequently, Jörg Lanz von Liebenfels) published a lengthy article under the Latin title "Anthropozoon Biblicum" ("The Biblical Man-Animal") in a journal for Biblical studies edited by Moritz Altschüler, a Jewish admirer of Guido von List. The author undertook a comparative survey of ancient Near Eastern cultures, in which he detected evidence from iconography and literature that seemed to point to the continued survival, into early historical times, of hominid ape-men similar to the Neanderthal men known from fossil remains in Europe, or the Pithecanthropus (now called Homo erectus) from Java.[42] Furthermore, Lanz systematically analysed the Old Testament in the light of his hypothesis, identifying and interpreting coded references to the ape-men that substantiated an illicit practice of interbreeding between humans and "lower" species in antiquity.

In 1905 he expanded these researches into a fundamental statement of doctrine titled Theozoologie oder die Kunde von den Sodoms-Äfflingen und dem Götter-Elektron[43] ("Theozoology, or the Science of the Sodomite-Apelings and the Divine Electron"). He claimed that "Aryan" peoples originated from interstellar deities (termed Theozoa) who bred by electricity, while "lower" races were a result of interbreeding between humans and ape-men (or Anthropozoa). The effects of racial crossing caused the atrophy of paranormal powers inherited from the gods, but these could be restored by the selective breeding of pure Aryan lineages. The book relied on somewhat lurid sexual imagery, decrying the abuse of white women by ethnically inferior but sexually active men. Thus, Lanz advocated mass castration of racially "apelike" or otherwise "inferior" males.[44] In the same year, Lanz commenced publication of the journal Ostara (named after a pagan Germanic goddess of spring) to promote his vision of racial purity.

Although List had been concerned "to awaken German nationalist consciousness",[49] the High Armanen Order had addressed itself to the upper and middle class Germans in Austria,[49] and here List had preferred the "role of the mystagogue"[50] over political activism. List's disciples, however, became active in the Reichshammerbund and the Germanenorden, two "historically significant", "virulently antisemitic groups"[50] in Germany. Both groups were organized by the political activist Theodor Fritsch, a major figure in German antisemitism. Fritsch, born 1852, was the son of Saxon peasants, and he was concerned about the "small tradesmen and craftsmen"[50] and their threat from what he perceived to be the large 'Jewish' industry.

The List-inspired Germanenorden (Germanic Order or Teutonic Order, not to be confused with the medieval German order of the Teutonic Knights) was a völkisch secret society in early 20th-century Germany. It was founded in Berlin in 1912 by Theodor Fritsch and several prominent German occultists including Philipp Stauff, who held office in the List Society and High Armanen Order as well as Hermann Pohl, who became the Germanenorden's first leader. The group was a clandestine movement aimed at the upper echelons of society and was a sister movement to the more mainstream Reichshammerbund.[51]

The order, whose symbol was a swastika, had a hierarchical fraternal structure similar to Freemasonry. Local groups of the sect met to celebrate the summer solstice, an important neopagan festivity in völkisch circles (and later in Nazi Germany), and more regularly to read the Eddas as well as some of the German mystics.[52]

In addition to occult and magical philosophies, it taught to its initiates nationalist ideologies of Nordic racial superiority and antisemitism, then rising throughout the Western world. As was becoming increasingly typical of völkisch organisations, it required its candidates to prove that they had no non-Aryan bloodlines and required from each a promise to maintain purity of his stock in marriage.

In 1916, during World War I, the Germanenorden split into two parts. Eberhard von Brockhusen became the Grand Master of the "loyalist" Germanenorden. Pohl, previously the order's Chancellor, founded a schismatic offshoot: the Germanenorden Walvater of the Holy Grail.[53][54] He was joined in the same year by Rudolf von Sebottendorff (formerly Rudolf Glauer), a wealthy adventurer with wide-ranging occult and mystical interests. A Freemason and a practitioner of sufism and astrology, Sebottendorff was also an admirer of Guido von List and Lanz von Liebenfels. Convinced that the Islamic and Germanic mystical systems shared a common Aryan root, he was attracted by Pohl's runic lore and became the Master of the Walvater's Bavarian province late in 1917. Charged with reviving the province's fortunes, Sebottendorff increased membership from about a hundred in 1917 to 1500 by the autumn of the following year.[55]

In 1918 Sebottendorff made contact with Walter Nauhaus, a member of the Germanenorden who headed a "Germanic study group" called the Thule Gesellschaft (Thule Society).[56] The name of Nauhaus's original Thule Society was adopted as a cover-name for Sebottendorff's Munich lodge of the Germanenorden Walvater when it was formally dedicated on August 18, 1918, with Pohl's assistance and approval.[57] Sebottendorff states that the group was run jointly by himself and Nauhaus.

Deriving elements of its ideology and membership from earlier occult groups founded by List (Guido von List Society, established 1908) and by Lanz von Liebenfels (the Order of the New Templars, established 1907), the Thule Society was dedicated to the triune god Walvater, identified with Wotan in triple form. For the Society's emblem Sebottendorff selected the oak leaves, dagger and swastika.[54] The name Thule (an island located by Greek geographers at the northernmost extremity of the world) was chosen for its significance in the works of Guido von List. According to Thule Society mythology, Thule was the capital of Hyperborea, a legendary country supposedly in the far North polar regions, originally mentioned by Herodotus, citing (among other sources[58]) Egyptian ones. In 1679, Olaf Rudbeck equated the Hyperboreans with the survivors of Atlantis, who were first mentioned by Plato, again following Egyptian sources. Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) began his work Der Antichrist (The Antichrist) in 1895 with, "Let us see ourselves for what we are. We are Hyperboreans."

From a historian's perspective, the importance of the Thule Society lies in its organising the discussion circle that led to the German Workers' Party (Deutsche Arbeiter-Partei, or DAP), founded in January 1919. The Thule Society's Karl Harrer was a co-founder, along with Anton Drexler (the party's first chairman). Later the same year, Adolf Hitler joined the DAP, which was renamed as the National Socialist German Workers' Party (German: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (NSDAP) or Nazi party, registered from 20 February 1920) on April 1, 1920. Some conspiracy-theorists argue that the NSDAP, when under Hitler's leadership, was a political front for the Thule Society. However, against this theory stands Harrer's and Drexler's resistance to Hitler. After unsuccessful challenges to his growing power, both men resigned from the party, Harrer in 1920 and Drexler in 1923.

Speculative authors assert that a number of high Nazi Party officials had been members of the Thule Society (including such prominent figures as Max Amann, Dietrich Eckart, Rudolf Hess, Alfred Rosenberg and Gottfried Feder). Eckart, the wealthy publisher of the newspaper Auf gut Deutsch (In Plain German), has been represented as a committed occultist and the most significant Thule influence on Hitler. He is believed to have taught Hitler a number of persuasive techniques, and so profound was his influence that the second volume of Hitler's book Mein Kampf was dedicated to him. However, although Eckart attended Thule Society meetings, he was not a member and there is nothing to indicate that he trained Hitler in techniques of a mystical nature. Examining the membership lists, Goodrick-Clarke[59] notes that Hess, Rosenberg and Feder were – like Eckart – guests of the Thule Society in 1918 but not actual members. He also describes a Thule Society membership roll including Hans Frank and Heinrich Himmler as "spurious". There is no evidence that Hitler himself had any connection with the Society, even as an associate or visitor. However, a member of the Thule Society, dentist Dr. Friedrich Krohn, did choose the swastika symbol for the Nazi party (although the design was revised at Hitler's insistence).

In 1923, Sebottendorff was expelled from Germany as an undesirable alien; around 1925, the Thule Society disbanded. In 1933, Sebottendorff returned to Germany and published Bevor Hitler kam: Urkundliches aus der Frühzeit der nationalsozialistischen Bewegung von Rudolf von Sebottendorff.[56] The book was banned by the Bavarian Political Police on March 1, 1934; Sebottendorff was arrested by the Gestapo, interned in a concentration camp, then expelled to Turkey yet again, where he committed suicide by drowning in the Bosphorus on May 9, 1945, as the Nazis surrendered to the Allies.

Rudolf John Gorsleben

Rudolf John Gorsleben was associated with the Thule Society during the Bavarian Soviet Republic of 1919 and, along with Dietrich Eckart, he was taken prisoner by the Communists, narrowly escaping execution. He threw himself into the ferment of Bavaria's völkisch politics and formed a close working relationship with the local Germanenorden before devoting himself to literary pursuits.[60]

On 29 November 1925, Gorsleben founded the Edda Society (Edda-Gesellschaft), a mystic study group, at Dinkelsbühl in Franconia. He himself was Chancellor of the Society and published its periodical Deutsche Freiheit (German Freedom), later renamed Arische Freiheit (Aryan Freedom). Assisted by learned contributors to his study-group, Gorsleben developed an original and eclectic mystery religion founded in part upon the Armanism of List, whom he quoted with approval.[61]

Grand Master of the Society was Werner von Bülow (1870–1947). The treasurer was Friedrich Schaefer from Mühlhausen, whose wife, Käthe, kept open house for another occult-völkisch circle (the 'Free Sons of the North and Baltic Seas') that gathered around Karl Maria Wiligut in the early 1930s.[62] Mathilde von Kemnitz, a prolific völkisch writer who married General Erich Ludendorff in 1926, was an active member of the Edda Society.[Note 8]

When Rudolf John Gorsleben died from heart disease in August 1930, the Edda Society was taken over by Bülow who had designed a 'world-rune-clock' that illustrated the correspondences between the runes, the gods and the zodiac, as well as colours and numbers. Bülow also took over the running of Gorsleben's periodical and changed its name from Arische Freiheit to Hag All All Hag, and then Hagal.

In the later 20th century, Germanic neopagan movements oriented themselves more towards polytheistic reconstructionism, turning away from theosophic and occult elements, but elements of Ariosophical mysticism continue to play a role in some white supremacist organizations. Alleged mystical or shamanic aspects of historical pre-Christian Germanic culture, summarized as seidr are also practiced in Odinism (Freya Aswynn, Nigel Pennick, Karl Spiesberger, see also Germanic Runic Astrology, The Book of Blotar).

Armanen-Orden

Circular arrangement of the Armanen Futharkh

Main article: Armanen-Orden

The Guido von List Society was re-established in the late 1960s through contacts between the German/Austrian occultist Adolf Schleipfer (1947–) and the still-living last president of the Society, Hanns Bierbach.[63] Schleipfer had discovered some of List's works in an antique bookstore in the mid-1960s, and was inspired to found the runic and Armanist magazine Irminsul[64] in hopes of attracting suitable people for a revived Listian order. He was appointed the new president and continued to publish Irminsul as the "Voice of the Guido von List Society."

Schleipfer also attended meetings of a related organisation, the Gode-Orden (Gothi-Order), which propagated a similar mixture of occult völkisch thinking. There he met his wife Sigrun Schleipfer, née Hammerbacher (1940–2009),[65] daughter of the völkisch writer and former NSDAP district leader, Dr. Hans Wilhelm Hammerbacher.[66] In 1976 the Schleipfers founded the Armanen-Orden (Armanen Order) as the reorganised Guido von List Society.[67] Since then, Adolf and Sigrun have served as the Grandmasters of the Order, although they have divorced and Sigrun now refers to herself as "Sigrun von Schlichting" or "Sigrun Freifrau von Schlichting". They also revived the High Armanen Order (HAO) and brought it to "an unprecedented level of activity".[68]

The Armanen-Orden is a neopagan esoteric society and religious order reviving the occult teachings of Guido von List. Its internal structure is organized in nine grades, inspired by Freemasonry. The order is modelled on, but not limited to, the precepts of List, and its principles as formulated in its brochures are as follows:

The Armanen Order embodies the entire Germanic and Celtic peoples in their mental, spiritual and physical uniqueness.

The Armanen Order embodies the true realisation of the divine world order based on Germanic and Celtic wisdom, whose religious and cultic aspect is formed by the native myths of the gods.

The Awakening of the Armanen Order is a rebirth of life based on its natural foundations of the Germanic and Celtic people.

The Armanen-Orden celebrates seasonal festivities in a similar fashion as Odinist groups do and invites interested people to these events. The highlights are three 'Things' at Ostara (Easter), Midsummer and Fall (Wotan's sacrificial death), which are mostly celebrated at castles close to sacred places, such as the Externsteine. The author Stefanie von Schnurbein attended a Fall Thing in 1990 and gives the following report in Religion als Kulturkritik (Religion and Cultural Criticism):

…the participants meet in a room decorated with hand-woven wall hangings and pictures of Germanic gods, Odin and Frigga in this case… At one end of the room is a table covered with black cloth. On this a 4 ft. high wooden Irminsul, a spear, a sword, a replica of a sun disc chariot, a leather-bound copy of The Edda as well as ritual bowls and candles are placed. The participants are seated in a semi-circle in front of the table, the front row being occupied by Order members clothed in their ritual garb (black shirts for the men and long white dresses for the women; both have the AO emblem sewn on them)… after several invocations the 'spirit flame', symbolising Odin in the spirit world, is lit in a bowl filled with lamp oil. The purpose of this cultic celebration is the portrayal of Odin's concentration from spirit into matter. After a recital of the first part of Odin's rune poem () from The Edda, the "blood sacrifice" commences, in which a bowl with animal blood is raised to the beat of a gong and an invocation of sacrifice. Then Odin is called into the realm by the participants who assume the Odal rune stance, whisper 'W-O-D-A-N' nine times and finally sing an ode to Odin with the following words: 'Odin-Wodan come to us, od-uod, uod'. Wodan's sacrifice to himself is symbolised by extinguishing the flame.

In 1977 Sigrun Schleipfer founded the Gemeinschaft zur Erhaltung der Burgen (Society for the Conservation of Castles), which proclaims castles to be among the "last paradises of the romantic era" in this cold modern age and had as its primary aim the purchase and restoration of a castle for the Order. In 1995, the society finally acquired the castle of Rothenhorn in Szlichtyngowa (Poland), a run-down structure dating back to the 12th century, though most of the complex dates from the 16th century.

Over many years, Adolf and Sigrun have republished all of List's works (and many others relating to the Armanen runes) in their original German. Adolf Schleipfer has also contributed an article to The Secret King, a study of Karl Maria Wiligut by Stephen Flowers and Michael Moynihan, in which he points out the differences between Wiligut's beliefs and those that are accepted within Odinism or Armanism.[69]

After the war, Lanz von Liebenfels was first brought to a wider (and scholarly) attention with Wilfried Daim's book Der Mann, der Hitler die Ideen gab (The Man Who Gave Hitler His Ideas) (1957). Although the book was not always taken seriously within academia, for some time Lanz was seen as one of the most important influences on Hitler. Since the 1990s, however, historians have cast doubt on Lanz' significance. The historian Brigitte Hamann, who has written Hitler's Vienna: A Dictator's Apprenticeship, is of the view that Lanz partly influenced Hitler's diction, but had only marginal influences on Adolf Hitler's religious views.

• Black Sun (occult symbol)
• Fylfot
• Glossary of Germanic mysticism
• Julius Evola
• Ludwig Fahrenkrog
• Neopaganism in German-speaking Europe
• René Guénon
• Sig Rune